Framing intercultural encounters in three Iberian translations of Kalila wa-Dimna

Abstract

Perhaps more than any other region in the Middle Ages, Iberia demonstrates the fluidity of the premodern world. Its position at a crossroads between East and West and the confluence of cultures and religions that inhabited the Peninsula created far-reaching connections that facilitated the dissemination of people, ideas, cultural forms, and material objects. A land of shifting borders and fluid configurations, Iberia triggers questions about boundaries and power struggles and brings to the fore issues of identity, alterity, and intercultural relations. This chapter traces the journeys of a work that characterizes the dynamism and porosity of Iberian space and whose history in western Europe is closely linked with the Peninsula: the highly influential Arabic collection of exemplary fables known as Kalila wa-Dimna. It offers a comparative analysis of three translations produced between the thirteenth and the seventeenth centuries: Calila e Dimna (1251), the Exemplario contra los engaños y peligros del mundo (1493), and the Espejo político y moral para príncipes y ministros y de todo género de personas (1654, 1659). While ostensibly the same collection of fables, each version arrived in Iberia via different routes and discrete sources and languages: Arabic, Latin (via Hebrew), and Turkish (via Persian) respectively—a fact that not only demonstrates the complexity of the book’s origins and transmission, but that highlights the Peninsula’s position as a point of intersection for global encounters. While Calila e Dimna and the Exemplario contra los engaños y peligros del mundo have been the subject of considerable research, the Espejo político y moral has garnered much less critical attention. Previous scholarship has also largely eschewed comparisons between the three Spanish versions. As this chapter argues, however, a cross-period, comparative approach provides a particularly productive methodology. The production of these translations spans 400 years in which the geo-political and ideological boundaries of the world were being recalibrated and the relationships between East and West recontextualized. Calila e Dimna, the Exemplario, and the Espejo político y moral represent productive textual spaces in which to consider not only the processes of translatio studii et imperii across this period but changing conceptualizations of identity and perspectives on intercultural relations. The essay explores the evolving significance of the fables by analyzing how each translation is reframed for new audiences through prefatory material and changes to physical form, as well as by considering a selection of tales that address topics of good governance, friendship, and enmity.